File photo by Michael S. Gordon / The RepublicanPaul L. Fickling, serving a life sentence for a double murder, is seen in Hampden Superior Court last month for hearing related to his request for a new trial. Fickling, 32, was convicted in 1997 of killing his former girlfriend, Amy Smith. Fickling's request is based on a confession to the murders by convicted serial murderer Alfred J. Gaynor, Fickling's uncle.SPRINGFIELD – Paul L. Fickling told Springfield police in 1996 that he choked and killed his former girlfriend Amy Smith, according to a detective who investigated the murder.
Anthony Pioggia told a judge on Wednesday that Fickling gave an oral confession to the killing when he was taken into custody on the night in July 1996 when the bodies of Smith and the couple’s 22-month-old daughter were found in a South End apartment.
But Pioggia acknowledged under questioning from Fickling’s lawyer Greg T. Schubert, that Fickling later that night signed two formal written statements in which he stated he did not kill Smith.
The testimony came during a hearing in Hampden Superior Court at which a new trial is being sought for Fickling on the basis of a confession by Fickling’s uncle, Alfred J. Gaynor, a convicted serial killer who says he acted alone in killing the woman.
Pioggia’s testimony also showed that Gaynor may have been mistaken about a key piece of evidence in the Smith case when he was interviewed by detectives in prison about his confession in December.
Fickling, 32, of Springfield, is serving a life sentence in state prison on murder charges for the deaths of Smith and their child, who died of dehydration and starvation. He was convicted by a jury at a trial in 1997, and the conviction was upheld by the state Supreme Judicial Court.
Judge Mary Lou Rup is being asked to decide if Gaynor’s confession to the crime should be the grounds to overturn the jury verdict and grant Fickling a new trial.
That request is based on last year’s confession by Gaynor, who was convicted in 2000 of killing four other Springfield women in the 1990s.
Under questioning from District Attorney William M. Bennett, who called Pioggia to testify in the hearing, the detective described how a sock had been found stuffed in Amy Smith’s mouth. Pioggia said when he and others met with Gaynor in prison in December 2008 Gaynor said he had stuffed panties in the woman’s mouth.
In one of the written statements Fickling gave police, he said had been at Smith’s apartment but another man, who he identified then as a John Belton, 31, known as “Broadway,” was with him. Fickling said he watched as that man beat and sexually assaulted Amy Smith and put her in a closet.
Belton was never charged in the case, did not testify before the jury, and his lawyer said he was not involved in the killing.
At Fickling’s trial in 1997, Schubert had argued that Pioggia and two other veteran homicide investigators crafted Fickling’s statements and had him sign them after hours of interrogation.
Bennett had dismissed that notion and said the jury rejected it, too.
The Fickling hearing will continue on a day to be determined. Schubert is waiting for results of DNA testing to see if he will present further evidence.
Gaynor, 42, testified on Wednesday that Fickling was not present when he killed Smith.
In earlier testimony in the hearing, Gaynor’s former lawyer Linda J. Thompson said Gaynor confessed to killing Smith to her a decade ago while he was awaiting prosecution for the other women’s murders.
Thompson said Gaynor only released her from the confidentiality provision between lawyer and client when Fickling’s request for a new trial was filed late last year.